Tuesday, September 16, 2014

I’ve put the conclusion first for those who don’t want to read a lot. Mobility equipment has to be easy for the sick or disabled person and their carers to use. It has to be convenient and reliable, not extra exhausting hassle. In scooters as in cars, you don’t expect a Mini to do the job of a Jeep. They are designed for different uses and both have their merits. The Luggie won’t take a weekly grocery shop home up a steep hill, but as a travel scooter, it is second to none.

The Luggie Elite was bought to replace a Pride Revo 4, which was so heavy to disassemble and put in a car boot that it wasn’t used very much. In two months I have used the Luggie Elite more than the Revo had been used in 9 years. The Luggie Elite is more comfortable than the Revo and performs better, particularly on hills. The build quality is superb and the metals used are top quality, although the plastics on the tiller seem a little cheap.

The Luggie is so portable. It has been on several train journeys, a few buses, taxis and ferries, as well as private cars. It is so easy to include it in everyday life, and this has had a good effect on relationships with family and friends. You don’t have to have strong men at hand to help you get it out of the car and put all the heavy pieces together and then do it all again in reverse. I have just been on holiday with a group of friends who used to get impatient with the time needed for assembling/disassembling, especially if it had to be done at several places on one day. They were very impressed with the convenience of the Luggie, and one of them is a GP. The Luggie makes life easy for everyone.

It can be used indoors, even in homes that do not have specially widened doorways. Being so portable, it is great for hospital appointments, which are usually along very long passageways and quite a distance from the car park or bus stop.

You don’t need a special hoist to get the Luggie in and out of a car, and that’s great because your family and friends are unlikely to have such a hoist in their vehicles. (Hoists would be needed for other brands of mini scooters as they don't have the flexible folding choices the Luggie has. Rented cars and taxis don't have hoists, and you are unlikely only ever to travel in your own car.)

By all means check out the competition, and I’d bet pounds to pennies that you’ll choose the Luggie and be delighted with it.

Things to bear in mind:

I have a large 3 wheeled scooter for everyday use, plus I had the Revo and I have used various other scooters from Shopmobility from time to time. The Luggie does not ‘handle’ like other scooters do, so I strongly urge new Luggie owners to take time to get to know their machine before taking it to unfamiliar places. It is a fabulous machine, but it is different, and there will be a learning curve.It is expensive and replacement batteries are expensive. Hopefully, in time the price will come down.

It is probably not the best piece of equipment to choose if you cannot walk at all. At times I have had to put my feet on the ground to ease the Luggie up a small kerb or to balance when I have approached a change of terrain from the wrong angle.

You have to be fairly fit to use a Luggie successfully. My ability is about 40% of what it was before I was ill and I cope well with the Luggie now. But when my ability was only 5% of what it had been, the Luggie would not have been the best choice in terms of support and suspension.

Having said all that, I can say sincerely that the Luggie was an excellent buy, and has opened up new possibilities for me and my family. The Luggie can go places other scooters can’t and as it is so ‘luggable’ it gets used very frequently. My partner and I firmly feel that the Luggie has been a marvellous investment and we look forward to lots of fun with it for years to come.

On the Isle of Wight

Charging in a restaurant, taking up very little space.

In the baggage compartment on a train. See how small it folds.

In France. No problem on the ferry.

The day it was delivered, 21 July 2014. Its so narrow it can be used
indoors without widening the doorways.

Saturday, April 12, 2014

The recent study by Goniewicz and colleagues1 points to the increasing popularity of electronic cigarettes among people who want to quit smoking, adds to the growing scientific evidence about their real-world use and in turn raises questions about their potential to reduce smoking-related disease.

Smoking is the leading cause of preventable death and disease globally, associated with nearly 6 million deaths annually; in the European Union smoking rates average 29% of the adult population, with 700 000 premature deaths each year. Most smokers want to quit smoking but find it hard to give up nicotine. Progress with reducing smoking continues, but the pace is slow. It is hard to see how the current non-communicable disease burden can be met without a drastic reduction in smoking prevalence. It is also hard to see how that can come about with current anti-smoking measures. The package of interventions in the European Tobacco Products Directive, including large health warnings and bans on small packs, is on the evidence of the European Commission’s own impact assessment likely to reduce tobacco consumption only by ∼2% over 5 years, which translates into ∼0.5% decline in prevalence in that time. Elsewhere, similarly modest historical gains have been demonstrated: graphic warning labels, introduced in Canada in 2000, are estimated to have helped reduce smoking prevalence by between 2.87 and 4.86% over 9 years, i.e. between 0.32 and 0.54 per annum.2 The contribution of conventional treatment interventions to reducing population prevalence of smoking appears negligible: in randomized controlled trials, nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) improves the chances of quitting, but in the real world of consumer self-initiated quit attempts, NRT confers no advantage over stopping without any aid.3 The jury is still out on whether NRT has had a measurable population-level impact. Population level declines in smoking are important but modest, and few could agree that the pace of reduction in smoking is fast enough. This means that countries face continued smoking-related morbidity and mortality for many decades.

Where conventional ‘quit smoking’ approaches have lingered, electronic cigarettes are an attractive alternative to tobacco cigarettes for established smokers who are unable or unwilling to give up nicotine. The available evidence in this fast-moving scientific field indicates that electronic cigarettes do not raise serious health concerns and the science suggests that electronic cigarettes are many times safer than the smoked tobacco against which they are competing.4 They are clearly popular among smokers and ex-smokers: in a short time there has been remarkable uptake in their use, with an estimated 7 million users in Europe and 1.3 million in the UK; in the USA, the value of sales is roughly doubling each year, from $20 million in 2008 to an estimated $1000 million in 2013. In the UK, Robert West’s Smoking Toolkit data show that electronic cigarettes have overtaken both NRT and health service stop smoking clinics as the most common resource used by people who want to stop smoking, with one in three quit attempts now involving the use of electronic cigarettes. Tobacco sales are declining, in part attributed to the rise of e-cigarettes, and the US stock market analysts estimate that e-cigarettes will overtake tobacco sales within 10 years.

Trial results suggest that electronic cigarettes are at least as effective as NRT in a randomized controlled trial. However, RCT data alone are an insufficient basis for public health planning. An intervention needs to be effective, acceptable and capable of being adopted on a mass scale at low cost. If data on effectiveness and popularity turn out to be true in the longer term, electronic cigarettes could be a more effective intervention at a population level than other stop-smoking initiatives.

The rise of the electronic cigarette is a consumer-led self-help public health movement, mostly spread by word of mouth, social media and direct point of sale advice at e-cigarette shops, with, until recently, little mass marketing. What other public health initiative could claim so many ‘converts’ in such a short time? This consumer public health movement is all the more remarkable because it has not used health care resources. It has not been a cost to taxpayers—being paid for by the consumer. This consumer-led public health initiative has all the hallmarks of what public health hopes to achieve.

The core public health mission is to prevent disease, prolong life and promote health. Good public health initiatives work with individuals and communities. The WHO Ottawa Charter for Health Promotion states ‘Health promotion is the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve, their health … People cannot achieve their fullest health potential unless they are able to take control of those things which determine their health’.5 This seems to be exactly what electronic cigarette consumers are doing—taking control of things that determine their health. So it is also remarkable that this trend in electronic cigarette use has had little support from public health experts. Public health has yet to engage with this new movement. In many countries the medical and public health response has been negative and overprecautionary. The reasons for this are complex, but for people who have dedicated their lives campaigning against smoking and for an end of the tobacco industry it seems hard to accept that this disruptive innovation might be a solution to smoking. The caution exhibited by public health experts has led to a chasm between them and consumers: evidenced by comments on social media, many e-cigarette consumers see public health as the enemy of health and consumer choice. This should be cause for sober reflection by public health professionals and is an extraordinary situation that needs to be remedied from both sides to maximize the public health potential of safer alternatives to smoking.

About 150,000 people in the UK have ME/CFS, 15,000 of whom are children.

The condition is characterised by physical and mental exhaustion following normal activities. Symptoms can include muscle pain, sore throat, tender lymph nodes, multi-joint pain and headaches.

In the study, funded by ME Research UK and The Young ME Sufferers (Tymes) Trust, 25 children aged between seven and 14 with ME/CFS were assessed, along with 23 children of a similar age in a control group.

The report, published in the Archives of Paediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, said abnormalities were found in the blood of all the children with ME/CFS.

The results were similar to those previously identified in adults with the condition.

Samples taken from youngsters with ME/CFS contained higher than normal levels of free radicals - molecules that can damage cells, tissues and organs.

Virus debate

A much greater number of neutrophils, the most common type of white blood cells, were also found to be at the end of their lifecycle.

The report said the high turnover of neutrophils indicated the body's need to fight infection.

“Start Quote

It's also important because some people do suggest that ME is a disease of the mind and here we are showing that it is a disease of the body”

Professor Jill BelchNinewells Hospital, Dundee

There is a continuing debate among scientists over whether ME/CFS is caused by a virus.

Several studies in adults have found evidence of a virus in people with the condition, but so far research has not proved conclusive.

Some doctors have said that the idea that different types of chronic fatigue are all caused by a single virus is not plausible.

Professor Jill Belch, an expert in vascular medicine at Ninewells hospital in Dundee who led the latest research project, said: "What we've found are blood changes that suggest chronic inflammation.

"This is important because it's showing an abnormality that we might be able to devise a treatment for, but it's also important because some people do suggest that ME is a disease of the mind and here we are showing that it is a disease of the body."

Dr Neil Abbot, of ME Research UK, said it was " fascinating to discover evidence of a persistent or reactivating viral infection".

"Although the cause of ME is unknown, more than half of all patients say their illness started with an infection," he said.

"The study undoubtedly adds greater scientific weight to the existence of a condition which, sadly, many still fail to acknowledge in spite of its severity."

According to Tymes Trust, children with ME can be treated with "scepticism" by the healthcare system.

'School refuser'

Jozef Mackie, 14, from Fortrose, near Inverness, was a sporty child who loved skiing, until the symptoms of ME began when he was nine years old.

His mother, Donna, said: "He was the boy whose battery wasn't working very well. He had to take more and more time off school.

"The other children were able to run around and do things after school and Joseph had to come home and lie on the settee."

For two years Jozef was labelled a "school refuser" and told it was "all in his head".

He was finally diagnosed with ME when he was 11.

"I haven't been treated very well," said Jozef. "I haven't been believed. They just think I'm putting it on.

"It's sore to get in and out of the car and I can't walk long distances."

Jane Colby, from Tymes Trust, added: "The medical profession must now take the consequences of ME in children seriously, and research into prevention and treatment must be given a high priority."

Sunday, July 21, 2013

I have started a Vaping Blog at Wordpress in order to tell people a little about Vaping. I think I'm going to move it to Blogger because it is much more customisable. But in the meantime, please visit Bakers Vapers Blog.

POTATO BASED PIZZA

BASE FOR THE TOPPING

6 large potatoes 2 Garlic cloves

6 spring onions 1 onion

2 eggs chopped tomatoes

Salt and pepper fresh basil leaves

Fry light 6oz/170g mozzarella cheese

Peel and dice potatoes, boil until tender, drain return to pan and mash. Set aside to cool a little. Meanwhile finely chop the spring onions. Place the mash, spring onions and one egg into a bowl and season well. Using your fingers, mix well and shape into a ball. Cover the bowl and chill overnight.

Prepare the topping: Crush garlic, finely chop onion, remove skins from toms (if using fresh) and chop basil leaves. Place in a pan with sweetener and bring to the boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 15-20 minutes, stirring often until thickened. Season well and remove from heat.

Preheat oven 200C/400F or gas mark 6. Line a baking sheet with baking parchment. Place the potato mixture in the centre and, using your hands, pat into 10in pizza base. Beat the remaining egg and brush over the base, spray with fry light and bake for 10-15 mins or until lightly browned.

Spread topping over base. Slice mozzarella and arrange on top. Return to oven for further 6-8 minutes. Remove from oven and scatter basil over the top.

Monday, October 29, 2012

1.5kg selfraising flour3 eggs250ml cream500ml buttermilk or plain yoghurt250 ml sugar250g butter5ml saltRub butter into flour.Beat eggs and sugar.Add buttermilk (yoghurt)Mix to a soft dough. Form balls of dough & pack tight in a greased dish.Bake at 180c or 350f for 35 minutes.Break cooked balls and spread them on the wire racks in the cooker.Dry overnight in cooker on a low temperature - 80c or so.

Method

Peel, core and cut the
apples into 1cm pieces, and toss with the lemon juice. Or use a tin of pie apples.

Cream together the butter, caster sugar and lemon zest in a
bowl until pale and fluffy. Beat in the eggs, 1 at a time, adding a little
flour with each addition to keep the mixture smooth.

Sift the remaining flour and the baking powder into the bowl
and fold in with the ground almonds and mixed spice. Stir the apple pieces into
the mixture.

Spoon into the prepared cake tin, lightly level the top and
sprinkle with the demerara sugar. Bake in the oven for 1 hour or until
well-risen, brown and a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out
clean. If the cake starts to look a little too brown, cover with a sheet of
baking paper after about 45 minutes.

Leave to cool in the tin for 10 minutes. Remove the cake
from the tin and place on a serving plate.

Dredge heavily with the extra caster
sugar.

Cut the cake into generous wedges and serve warm with a
spoonful of clotted cream, if you like.

My dear granddaughter has been diagnosed with Coeliac Disease. Her mum is very busy with a husband and household to run and three kids, a dog, a cat and two Guinea Pigs. As she is so busy I am experimenting with some Coeliac friendly recipes. When I find a recipe that works well, I will make it a few times and then show my daughter how to do it when she has a bit of spare time.

I have a few criteria for the recipes.

1. They have to be easy to make

2. Ingredients must be easy to find

3. Ingredients should not be beyond the budget of an ordinary working family, and

4. All the family should like them, not just the Coeliac person. I don't think its good for one person in a family to be singled out and made to eat 'yucky' stuff while everyone else eats 'yummy' stuff.

Friday, April 20, 2012

SUGGESTION:
The Government needs to be straight with us and tell us whether they believe an ill or disabled person has a right to live or not. Because if so many thousands of people are to lose the means for their survival, the only decent thing for the Government to do is to send out cyanide capsules with their refusal of benefit letters.
Shall we embarrass them by putting a petition to this effect on the Downing Street website?

Caelyn’s baby, Tristan James, was born during a gale with torrential rain on Monday 12 December.As the winds were buffeting the car so much, they didn’t get to the hospital in time.I had phoned ahead and Labour Ward had told me that they would examine her, but that they had no beds.

They got as far as the ambulance bay, and Nigel called an ambulance crew to come and help and they were calm and laid back about it until they saw Caelyn – and Tristan’s head!No one knows how, but an emergency call must have been sent because two ladies came running in their scrubs.A Paramedic sat behind Caelyn to support her shoulders and back; Nigel was in the front seat holding one of her legs and the N2O.All four car doors were open so an icy wet wind was blowing through the car.Somehow, some screens were put in place.Caelyn was the only one who stayed relatively dry – everyone else was standing outside in the rain and wind.I think they all were frozen.

Baby was born, and as soon as the cord was cut, he was bundled up and the lady who delivered him handed him to the other one and told her “get this baby inside”.So off she went with Tristan (whose Apgar was 9 at birth and 10 at 5 minutes!) while the other lady saw to the placenta which came about 20 min later.Then Caelyn was put on a trolley and taken upstairs.She and Tristan were very cold, and even with lots of hot drinks and extra blankets, it took until 04h30 for her to stop shivering.

She was the talk of the ward, and several staff members stopped by to see her and wish her well.It turned out that the lady who delivered him was a paediatrician!I bet delivering her patients doesn’t happen too often!Caelyn was very happy with the care she received.

Then Meridian News started phoning the ward, wanting to do interviews, but she said she just wanted to get home.She did cave in eventually – all sorts of news people were sending her messages on Facebook.So here are some links.The BBC filmed her for the News and the page has a video of the interview, if you can see it in your part of the world.

After all that, Caelyn says she feels well for the first time in months, and Tristan is a contented little baby who is feeding like a gannet.

Well, thats quite a story to tell the lad when he grows up! There is just one worry, and that is that he was conceived while his mother had a contraceptive device surgically implanted in her arm, and it has a failure rate of 0.04%. The pregnancy was very troubled, and Caelyn spent a lot of time in hospital. They stopped premature labour 3 times. Her kidneys were failing and her breathing was a big problem, with her only having a Peak Flow of 150 for most of the time. Then he was born like this. You know how we say that if there is a bizarre or weird situation, our Kate is in the middle of it? I wonder if young Tristan is going to follow in his mother's footsteps ...

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

My daughter Caelyn went into labour last night when the weather was at its worst. The wind buffeted the car so much her husband couldn't get there fast enough & she said she had to push, so Nigel pulled into the ambulance bay of William Harvey. He called to the ambulance crew. When they came over, they could see his head.

A doctor & midwife came running. Caelyn was on the back seat of the car & the medical staff had to stand in the wind and rain to deliver him. They got soaked. As soon as he was born, they wrapped him up & took him in out of the weather, then the ambulance crew put Caelyn on a trolley to take her in.

Mother and baby are both well, and already the talk of the ward, with staff popping in specially to see him. They are due to be discharged later today.

In view of the circumstances of his birth, a special name is called for, but we can't think of one. His sisters can't wait to meet him.

At about 10 pm on Monday 12 December, Caelyn had a son. He weighs 2.3 kg or 5 lb 12 oz, and he and his mum are both well.

When they left for the hospital, Caelyn asked me to phone to say they were en route. The midwife said they would examine her but they had NO BEDS AVAILABLE.

Then I had a call from my mum & I was expecting her to say they were being sent to another hospital, but she very excitedly told me he had been born in his dads car! Nigel pulled up to the ambulance bay and asked for help. They were just about to get a wheelchair but then realised there was no time, so the ambulance man delivered him there and then, in a howling gale and torrential rain. Mum phoned me as they were helping then inside after the delivery.

Congratulations to all concerned. I can't wait to see Wendy and Teresa when they are told their little brother arrived in the night!

Monday, November 21, 2011

This, apparently is an actual letter received by the UK Passport Office.

Dear Sirs,

I'm in the process of renewing my passport, and still cannot believe this.. How is it that Sky Television has my address and telephone number and knows that I bought a bleeding satellite dish from them back in 1977, and yet, the Government is still asking me where I was bloody born and on what date.

For Christ sakes, do you guys do this by hand? My birth date you have on my pension book, and it is on all the income tax forms I've filed for the past 30 years. It is on my National Health card, my driving license, my car insurance, on the last eight damn passports I've had, on all those stupid customs declaration forms I've had to fill out before being allowed off the plane over the last 30 years, and all those insufferable census forms.

Would somebody please take note, once and for all, that my mother's name is Mary Anne, my father's name is Robert and I'd be absolutely astounded if that ever changed between now and when I die!!!!!!

I apologise, I'm really pissed off this morning. Between you and me, I've had enough of this bullshit! You send the application to my house, then you ask me for my bloody address!!!!

What is going on? Do you have a gang of neanderthal arseholes workin' there? Look at my damn picture. Do I look like Bin Laden? I don't want to dig up Yasser Arafat, for gods sake. I just want to go and park my arse on some sandy beach somewhere. And would someone please tell me, why would you give a shit whether I plan on visiting a farm in the next 15 days? If I ever got the urge to do something weird to a chicken or a goat, believe you me, you'd be the last bloody people I'd want to tell !!

Well, I have to go now, because I have to go to the other end of the poxy city to get yet another copy of my birth certificate, to the tune of £30. Would it be so complicated to have all the services in the same spot to assist in the issuance of a new passport the same day?? Nooooooooooooo, that'd be too damn easy and maybe make sense. You'd rather have us running all over the bloody place like chickens with our heads cut off, then have to find some arsehole to confirm that it's really me on the damn picture - you know, the one where we're not allowed to smile?! (bureaucratic morons) Hey, do you know why we couldn't smile if we wanted to? Because we're totally pissed off!

Signed

An Irate Subject

P.S. Remember what I said above about the picture and getting someone to confirm that it's me? Well, my family has been in this country since 1776 ............ I have served in the military for something over 30 years and have had full security clearances over 25 of those years enabling me to undertake highly secretive missions all over the world. ......... However, I have to get someone 'important' to verify who I am - you know, someone like my doctor - WHO WAS BORN AND RAISED IN SODDING PAKISTAN !

Saturday, October 08, 2011

Monday, September 26, 2011

The scan picture clearly shows little feet. This is Michelle's 18 week scan. There is another picture I'd like to post of the baby reaching out with his arm. His fingers are clearly visible. There was so much excitement in the scanning room. We saw his heart beating and we also saw the ridges and gullies of his brain. Michelle says he is especially active this evening.

On the way back from the hospital, we called in at Caelyn's. The two sisters were sooooo excited and were comparing bumps and maternity notes. Its exciting for them to be expecting together.

They will be Winter babies.

One problem is that Caelyn's village gets cut off during heavy snow, and she delivered her two daughters quickly. The midwife has told her to call at the first twinge and they are thinking it might end up as a home birth if its too dangerous to try to get to hospital. That's Plan B.

Plan C, if the midwife can't get to her, I've suggested that Nigel put her on a sled and take her to the Old Age Home nearby because at least three of the staff there have been senior midwives for a long time. They obviously don't keep midwifery equipment there, but they would have a better idea of what to do than Nigel would.

The other thing is that this winter is forecast to be a harsh one, and the cost of heating has gone up by double figures. We couldn't afford it last year when it was cheaper. We will have to keep one room warm and stay in that one with the baby. Otherwise, we will keep heavy curtains closed to keep the heat in, drink hot drinks, move around, put on extra layers of clothing and use blankets when we are sitting still.

Thursday, August 18, 2011

When Michelle told her doctor she was pregnant, he didn't believe her because he has reports from 3 Consultants saying that she could not have children due to a problem with her ovaries.
We are delighted for her. This is a Miracle baby, and very, very welcome. Little one is due on 22 February. Caelyn's boy is due at the beginning of January, so my guess is that the cousins will get up to a lot of mischief together.